


Years, and linger

by RageSeptember



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Angst, BAMF!Raven, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, M/M, Post-Canon, Post-DOFP, Raven and Erik are bros, Raven initially DOES know better, Raven should know better, Then more angst, Vignettes, XMA - Freeform, dammmit Erik, who knows why, with alcohol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-07-25 11:46:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 9,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7531558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RageSeptember/pseuds/RageSeptember
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What's a bullet or two between friends? Raven and Erik, through the years, in vignettes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1973

**Author's Note:**

> I can't be the only one who found it strange that Raven would be so eager to rush to Erik's aid in XMA, considering all that went on in DOFP, right? It just seems like something must have happened between them in those missing years... Starts out pretty bleak, gets fluffier, and the XMA happens. I am a sucker for happy endings (and eventual Cherik!) though, so there's that. 
> 
> Please note that tags refer to the fic in its entirety, and might not be applicable to each and every chapter.

The first time she runs into Erik Lehnsherr after his ill-fated bid at world domination it is entirely accidental and rather anticlimactic; Raven literally bumps into him. On her way to a safe-house in Paramaribo, she pays too much attention to the two policemen yelling at a young man in jeans that might or might not be concealing a tail, and too little to the corner she's turning.

She recognizes the voice apologizing in Dutch even before she recognizes the face of the man she's slammed into. ”Erik?”

Naturally, it takes him a moment; she's in the shape of an older gentleman with thinning black hair, copied from the border control officer who failed to give her fake passport more than a cursory glance when she entered the country a couple of hours ago. First, Erik tenses minutely. She knows him well, and knows that he'll try to buy time by feigning confusion, all the while preparing himself for a swift attack, followed by a swift retreat. She allows her eyes to flash yellow, and some of the tension leaves his body, though not all. ”Mystique.”

Four billion people on the planet. What are the odds? Then again, perhaps it's not quite as big a coincidence as it might seem; if she had seen a likely place to hide in their old haunt in Suriname, off the South American north coast and seeing unprecedented mass migration in anticipation of coming independence, it isn't unreasonable that he will have done the same. They're both fugitives, after all, although for entirely different reasons.

Perhaps it would have been better to just accept his apology and let him wander off none the wiser.

He is watching her warily, and she stares right back. She still hasn't forgotten the sense of shock and dread being replaced with a profound _lack of surprise_ when he pointed that gun at her in Paris. _Of course_ he'd turned on her the moment he thought her a threat, and any shared past be damned. What was her loyalty, what was patching each other up after missions gone wrong, what was long nights of conversation determinedly not about Charles and a shared vision for the future of mutantkind when put against his fanatical resolve that nothing, nothing, _nothing_ must ever stand in the way of said future?

It's enough to make her want to shoot him again. Maybe a bit further down and more to the middle.

”Are you heading for the safe house?” His question brings her out of her blood-soaked reverie, and her eyes snap from the scar on his neck and to his face. He looks haggard behind a large and frankly ludicrous beard, and much too pale. Although there's been countless reports of sightings in the media and a number of crimes attributed to the villainous Magneto in the past few months, she is fairly certain that he hasn't actually done anything but lay low. He's not been in touch with any of the old contacts, she knows that much.

She takes a moment longer to answer his question, unsure if it's wise to share any sort of information at all with him. ”I was. You've been there?”

He nods, just once. ”It's been compromised.” A pause, then resignedly: ”Someone recognized me.”

She realizes she can hear sirens in the distance, coming closer. ”Goddammit, Erik,” she curses, already turning away from him. She'll need to get out of the city, out of the country, _now_. ”How about you stop fucking things up for a change?”

He doesn't reply, and she doesn't look over her shoulder to catch one last glimpse of him. In tomorrow's papers she'll read about the merry chase Magneto's led the Surinamese armed forces on, leaving torn and twisted metal in his wake like some sort of demented trail of crumbs, across the river and east, in the opposite direction of where she was going.

It's not enough, of course, but with Erik you take what you can get.


	2. 1974

Perhaps getting in each other’s way is their thing now, because the next time she sees Erik they’re both trying to rescue the same group of mutants. She’s traveled to Moscow for this very purpose; he’s apparently been hiding out in a tiny one room apartment ten minutes away from the Dormiton Cathedral since March.

“You’ve been here for three months and you haven’t done anything to stop this until now?” Raven demands as they walk down Tsvetnoi Boulevard, him hiding behind large sunglasses, she in the guise of a non-descript middle-aged woman. She's still not sure if happening upon him doing re-con outside of the circus last night had been a good thing or not. She's still not sure of working together is the best idea either, but it'd seemed the obvious option once they'd stopped staring at each other with guarded suspicion.

“It didn’t make the news until two days ago,” Erik says, flatly.

“And you had no idea it was happening until you heard it on the news? You used to be more perceptive than that.” The rumours of mutants displayed as monstrous curiosities had reached her well over a month ago, but finding a way into Russia isn't easy.

“It's a big city and walks around town isn’t my main pastime these days.” And no, it wouldn’t be, even though his face is no longer in every paper or on every TV screen. He’s old news now, Magneto, and there are so many other mutants. Most of them distinctly _not_ bent on the subjugation of humankind, which really helps create public goodwill. There's more of that than Raven could ever have imagined, but not enough, not nearly enough, and she's still furious that they should have to _earn_ the benefit of the doubt automatically granted to regular humans.

They stop one block away from the circus. ”That's the car,” he tells her, handing her the keys as he nods towards a green Fiat parked on a side street.

There are no goodbyes and no well-wishes; they simply part ways, him heading for the grand entrance, she for the stage-door. It's only ten minutes before one of the lion tamers step outside for a smoke; it is but a moment's work to knock him unconscious and hide him, tied up and gagged, behind a dumpster.

”This is where they do the animal acts,” Erik had told her the night before, as they stared up at the rather unimpressive building. ”They've got another circus for trapeze and acrobatics.” The anger in his voice had been comforting in its familiarity, remembered from the early days of the Brotherhood, when he burned with the power of his conviction and she with newfound confidence, and everything was still possible.

For a while there, they'd made one hell of a team.

Raven changes from the middle-aged woman into the lion tamer and slips inside. The smell is almost enough to make her gag, all excrement and sweat and rotting meat. Dimly lit, confined, and crowding with people busy preparing for the show, it's an ideal place to move about without anyone bothering her, though, and that's almost enough to make up for the smell.

Having found a good spot to lounge unobtrusively near the stage, Raven catches a glimpse of one of the four mutants. He's a small, crooked thing with large, pointed ears and eyes that keep darting every which way. He can shoot flames from his fingertips, according to her sources, but seeing the way he moves – shoulders hunched, never straying from the walls – she understands why he's not made a break for it. Cowed, house-broken. Maybe even thinks himself the monster the humans tell him that he is.

The three others are supposedly female, but apart from one of them being green Raven has no idea what they look like. This doesn't pose any real problem, as the grand finale of every show is the four mutants performing together. That's when Erik will strike, from his seat in the audience, and that's when she'll whisk the mutants away. (Erik calls them brothers and sisters, as he's always done, and it makes her a little amused and a little sad, because he's otherwise so very, very careful about keeping his desire for a new family and a new people a hidden, private thing.)

”I'll weaken the beams gradually,” he'd said, five minutes into their impromptu and disconcertingly efficient strategy meeting last night. ”They might think it's an accident.”

”Try not to kill anyone.” Not that she has any particular pity for humans who pay to see enslaved mutants perform tricks, but there'll be less outrage that way. Less pressure put on Charles to provide damage-control by being the face of all good little mutants, _no danger here, sir, all we want is to be a productive part of society, truly._

_Don't worry, big brother, I've got your back._

\---

It's messy, of course, as things tend to get when half the roof collapses over a full auditorium, but Raven gets the mutants out with only minor, language-related, difficulty. They don't speak English, and she doesn't speak anything but. Erik has provided her with an explanatory note in Russian, but it's not the sort of thing you pull out and make people read in the middle of buildings falling down.

Nobody dies. One elderly lady breaks her right arm and a member of KGB will never walk straight again. Erik's attempt at subtlety unfortunately fails – but that's no surprise, really, because whenever something weird with metal happens these days Magneto tends to get blamed – and he's back in the headlines. Big, bold ones, over the picture of his helmeted face from Washington; the face of mutant evil just as surely as Charles is the face of mutant good. Renewed calls for Magneto's capture, for restrictions, registration, and reports of some poor bastard with a fleeting resemblance to Erik beaten to death outside of the Kremlin.

Raven wonders what Charles will make of it, on the other side of the world. Will he applaud Erik and her freeing the mutants, or condemn them for yet another act of 'mindless and vicious destruction' as the media labels it?

Will he regret letting them go?

\---

”You're still here.”

Erik steps aside to let her walk through the door, then immediately closes it behind her. ”If you didn't expect me to be, why come knocking?”

”You know me. I don't mind taking my chances.”

It's been three days since the circus, and the four mutants they rescued are already halfway to China on a cargo ship. They won't be safe in Peking, because their kind isn't safe anywhere, but at least they'll be free. They'll have a chance.

Raven looks around the cramped room. It is small and it is dark with flaking brown wall paint, and it's not at all the sort of place the Erik she knew would care to stay in for a prolonged period of time. He's no stranger to discomfort or poverty, and they've spent their fair share of time in dingy motels, but when choosing more permanent dwellings he tends towards the neat and clean and preferably spacious.

”You're not planning on staying here, are you?” she asks.

”No. But I'll give it a few days, let the worst of it die down.

Her own plan exactly. She'd find it disconcerting, how well their thoughts align, how easy it had been for them to formulate a joint plan of attack, but it's no surprise, not really. Erik had been her mentor once, and for all that she's long since outgrown the need and patience for one, she still remembers his lessons.

”Have you seen the news?” There's no TV, but a small radio perched precariously on the rackety table.

”Yes.” He's standing by the wall, arms crossed and watching her every move. Probably unsure if a temporary team-up had been enough to erase some of their recent past.

Raven isn't too sure herself. She doesn't particularly feel like punching him in the face, and the memory of his betrayal in Paris doesn't carry quite the sting it used to, but that might be because the man before her bears only the vaguest resemblance to the man who'd aimed a gun at her. Not as haggard as in Paramaribo, and the beard is trimmed down to a reasonable length, but he still seems… smaller. Worn thin.

Maybe that's why he doesn't offer any protests when she tells him that perhaps he ought to disappear properly, this time, and stay disappeared. He should leave the mutant saving business to her, because she can manage well enough, and the sooner Magneto's name is forgotten, the better for all mutants.

The best he can do for this fight is to walk away from it.

\---

She is somewhat surprised when he actually does, and more surprised still when she doesn't feel entirely pleased about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My apologies to the Moscow State Circus. I'm sure it didn't smell quite as bad as all that.


	3. 1976

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not actually sure when Nina's supposed to be born, so I just went with whatever worked for the story.

The house is really more of a cottage, and it's the last place she would have expected to find him. Two miles away from the nearest neighbor, nestled among tall trees and golden-gray in the setting October sun; it seems far too tranquil a place for the man known to the world as Magneto. Far too tranquil for the man known to her as Erik, for that matter.

Probably the point.

She lets herself in through the – shockingly – unlocked front door. Resisting the urge to snoop, she reverts to her true blue form and sits down in a worn but comfortable armchair to wait for Erik to return home. The room is neat and clean, but _cozy_ in a way she can't quite square with the memories of the man she's here to see. Folded blankets, decorative pillows, and what appears to be a hand-carved clock on the wall, ticking the seconds away. It suggests a simple but comfortable life, a _settled_ life. It's… strange.

Enough so that she begins to wonder if she's got the wrong house after all, but the name on the mailbox says Górski and apparently that's what he's calling himself these days, so.

It's already a quarter to six when Erik walks through the door, still in his work clothes and with a bag of groceries in his arms. Catching sight of her, he doesn't look pleased. In fact, he looks downright horrified, and that's just a little bit insulting.

”Relax,” she scoffs, standing up. ”Nobody saw me enter, and if they had, they'd have seen that short man with the mustache you were talking to at lunch break.” She cocks her head to the side. ”Is the irony of you working at a steel factory intentional or just the universe having a laugh?”

”What are you doing here, Mystique?”

Fine then. She doesn't mind getting straight down to business. ”There's a guy with unbreakable skin and super strength being held in a cosmetics lab in Geneva. His cell is all armoured steel and barbed wires. I could use your help breaking him out.”

He simply stares at her, but gone are the days when he could quell her merely with the – admittedly great – power of his glare. Eventually he gives an exasperated sigh and puts his groceries down on the kitchen counter. ”Two years ago you told me to stay out of everything, and now you want me to walk straight into a trap that obviously is specifically designed to catch me?”

Put like that it doesn't sound entirely reasonable, she has to give him that. After leaving Russia he has, as far as she can tell, stayed off the radar completely. There's been no more run-ins, not as much as a whiff of him since Moscow. Fewer and fewer Magneto news stories, too, until the only ones left are the obligatory pieces run at the anniversary of 'the mutant revelation' – and they are dedicated more to her bravery (please… !) than his evil. She still has her work cut out for her, because wherever there's mutants there are humans more than willing to abuse them, but… by and large, things are not as bad as they could have been. Charles is doing a pretty fine job of public relations, advertising his newly re-opened school at every opportunity, and Raven is there to save the poor souls beyond her brother's benevolent reach.

The world, and Raven, are managing just fine without Magneto. She's only slightly surprised to find that he, in turn, seems to be managing perfectly well without them. Standing tall once more, the haunted look gone from his eyes. Clearly at edge at this very moment, but something in the way he moves suggests that he is more relaxed than she's seen him in… well, forever.

That's strange, too, in the same way the blankets and pillows are strange. A sudden sense of vertigo, as if she doesn't know the man before her at all –

She pushes her momentary confusion aside. What does it matter? She came her for a reason, and Erik's general well-being isn't it. ” _Becaus_ e it's a trap set for you, it's made so that you're the only one who can break him out,” she explains. Why a cosmetics lab would bother to try to trap Magneto is beyond her, but maybe someone is paying them to. She doesn't much care, really. ”Trust me, I wouldn't be here if I had a better choice. And I have some ideas about how to get you out of there safe and sound. They're torturing him, Erik,” she adds when she sees the extremely skeptical look on his face. ”Running all sorts of clinical experiments to create fucking anti-aging creams.”

He closes his eyes, and she feels a twinge of regret. Of course this hits him hard, because whoever set the trap knows enough to know how sensitive Magneto will be to mutants being held captive and tortured. Not many details of Erik Lehnsherr's early life have made it to the press, but enough of them for that.

”Everything we've done, we've done to protect them,” she says quietly when a minute has come and gone, carefully measured by the wooden clock, and he still doesn’t speak. ”How can we justify any of it if we're not prepared to risk everything to protect them now?” And really, it's as much a question for her as it is for him, and one she's asked herself many times, whenever she starts feeling that it's all too much; too much suffering, too much to do, and she's only one person and – 

A shudder passes through him, and she thinks she can see his face twist into something ugly and pained before he turns his back at her. ”I… can't. Not now.”

”You _can't_?” Her hands clench into fists, the anger a sudden, snarling thing. Who the hell is he to start putting his own security before that of their kind _now_? He, who was so very quick to sacrifice her for the greater good? Who walked away from Charles bleeding on the beach because he was too damned eager for his fucking war to even get his friend to a hospital first? (Who was she, who did the same?)

”No. I can't.” Tired, but firm. Still with his back towards her. 

There are too many things she wants to scream at him; she doesn't know where to start. He begins to unpack the groceries and only now does she look at his hands and she blinks, anger replaced by astonishment in the flicker of an eye. ”You're _married_?”

”Yes.” He's glancing at her now, a hint of a wicked grin on his face, and suddenly he is the man she knew once more.

Except he's married. 

Erik. Married. _Damn._ Did Caliban not know, or had the little bastard simply withheld the information for some inexplicable Caliban reason? Probably the former, Raven decides. His psychics are vague at best, and they'd only managed to point her to the nearest town. The rest had been almost a week of good old-fashioned detective work and countless dead ends.

”And is it… like real love, or just a convenient cover?” Blunt, even for her, but he's actually managed to genuinely blindside her. No mean feat, that.

He gives her a look like he doesn't think it's any of her business. ”They're not mutually exclusive, are they?”

Perhaps she should let that pointed non-answer deter her from furthering questioning, but she's too curious not to ask. ”Is she like us?”

”No.” The reply is short, but there's something strange and soft in his eyes, an almost wondering smile lurking at the corner of his lips. A beat, another glance, and then he offers, very quietly: ”We're having a baby.” 

Erik doesn't go with her to Geneva, but she can't really blame him, and she gets the guy out anyway.


	4. 1978

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a tiny short thing. The next one is likely to be equally concise; sorry about that.

”When you didn't kill me, was that because you wanted them to have me?”

It's such a non sequitur that Raven does nothing but blink at Erik for a few moments. It's partly to make him less blurry, but mostly because she has no idea what he's on about. ”What?” she eventually manages, half-yelling to be heard over _Stayin' Alive_ and four bearded Catholic priests dancing on the table next to theirs. Raven is no expert on religion, but she'd always had this idea that dancing on the table is one of those things _not done_ by the clergy. Neither is buying vodka shots for everyone, or so she'd have said an hour ago, but there's three empty glasses before her and the memory a jubilant ”Karol Wojtyła!” shouted in her ear, so okay.

Who'd known that Kraków was the place to be if you wanted a proper party behind the Iron Curtain? Apparently East Berlin is kicking as well, but Raven hasn't been there in ages. Hasn't been east of the wall in years actually, not since her unsuccessful attempt at enlisting Erik's help two years previously.

It'd been an unexpected impulse, calling him just because she was in the vicinity. Maybe she's feeling nostalgic, or maybe it's just been ages since she _talked_ to someone, properly _talked_. He'd come readily enough, though she suspects he wouldn't have if his wife and child weren't visiting with his mother-in-law for the weekend.

He'd shown her pictures of Nina, and she'd made all the right noises, ooohs and aaaws, but really she's still too taken aback by the notion of Erik as a father to pay too much attention to his actual child. _It suits him_ , she thinks, and she can't quite define the feeling that comes with that realization. Wonder, maybe, or betrayal, or simple disbelief. All of that, perhaps, and happiness too; _good for you, Erik._

He waves his hand now, violently enough to spill at least half of the contents of the glass his holding. The whisky is cheap in this club, but really, that's just wasteful. How much do a steelworker make anyway? Not enough to carelessly throw away whisky, that's how much. ”In Washington,” Erik clarifies. ”When you shot me. You didn't kill me. Was it because you wanted them to put me back in the cell?”

 _Oh._ She gets it now; both the actual question, and what he's _really_ asking. Had her act of mercy really been an act of revenge, condemning him to a fate worse than death as payback for Paris? 

”Listen, everyone knows that being friends with you includes having to get over the occasional assassination attempt,” she says, making light of it because it is almost three in the morning, she hasn't been this drunk in over a decade, and she is not in the mood for some mushy heart-to-heart. ”You shot me, I shot you, we both lived, we're square. Okay?” 

”Okay.” He sounds completely neutral, but that's how Erik sounds almost all the time, so it doesn't mean shit. She hopes he'll leave it at that, though, because, again: not in the mood. But when did Erik ever do what you wanted him to? Finishing off what's left of his whisky, he asks with what seems genuine curiosity: ”How could you be so sure Charles wouldn't give me up?”

And she laughs long and hard at that because _really_ , for a clever guy Erik is a huge fucking idiot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Karol Wojtyła was the archishop of Kraków when he was elevated to papacy in 1978, and subsequently became fairly famous under the name of John Paul II. 
> 
> In additional and entirely pointless but fairly amusing news, I use an online spellcheck to proofread these vignettes, since my word processor refuses to deal with English and I don't actually know how to write this devilish language. When happening upon the 'fucking' in the last sentence, the pellcheck kindly advised me that 'what a fuck'n disaster' might readily be replaced with 'could you please fetch me a mop', and 'don't be such a fuck' with 'reach deep within and find your inner kindness'.


	5. 1981

Kraków evenings in June are warm and smell of daisies. There are no celebrating priests or free vodka shots in the pub they visit this time, but they're not here to get drunk so that's fine. At least she thinks that's not why they're here: Erik's short – and surprising – message of 'let me know when you're in Poland next time if you want to meet up' hadn't exactly given much away.

She'd had no plans to visit the country any time soon, but three days after the vague note reaches her in Baghdad she's there. So she's curious, and Erik knows her well enough to play on that – what of it? If he's made the effort to reach out, there's a reason for it, and one that has nothing to do with catching up with an old associate.

Except apparently that's exactly what they're doing. They order beers and she tells him of her various exploits, all the mutants saved, and he talks about his daughter and her budding ability to communicate with animals. It's all very… relaxed.

It's also not why he's gotten in touch, but Raven doesn't push. Though patience doesn't come naturally to her, she has learned how to wait, and when. ”Never thought I'd see you in plaid,” she offers instead. ”It's a much better look than the cape and helmet. Not as impressive, but better.”

Erik smiles, and says he's taken up gardening.

They're two hours and four beers into the conversation when he finally gets to the point. He does so offhandedly, elbows on the table, glass in hand, and with eyes on a bald man walking a dog outside the window. If she hadn't known him as well as she does, she'd have thought the question an idle one, without any consequence at all.

For a man who tends towards brutal honesty, Erik is a highly accomplished actor.

“Have you talked to Charles?” is what he asks, and for a moment she says nothing. Charles is the one thing they've always had in common, and the one thing they never talk about. Too much danger there, and hurt, and love. 

Then she lets out a slow breath, long as if twenty years in the making. “No. But I think he might have… checked in on me, once or twice.” Fleeting touches, so gentle and brief they might as well have been nothing more than her imagination. How very typical of Charles; determined to get things right this time by respecting her silence, but still unable to keep away completely. “You?”

“Same.” There is a long pause. Raven waits. “I was thinking, maybe, when Nina is older… “ His voice trails off.

“Charles would like that,” she offers after a moment of stunned silence, taken aback that he would need her reassurance; that he would go to all this trouble simply to have it. Surely he must know that Charles will always welcome him back with open arms, sappy sod that he is. And even if he did not, Charles would never turn away a child because of their parent's crimes. “But are you sure you want Nina to be brought up on all that peaceful coexistence crap?” There’s no challenge there; she is simply curious. 

Erik shrugs, puts off answering by taking several sips of his beer. “Things change. I’m not saying I agree with Charles, but I think his school might be a good place for Nina. I don't want her to have to hide. I want her to know that she's not alone, and… ” Another shrug. ”Charles is good with that sort of thing.”

Raven merely nods, washing down the sudden, unexpected lump in her throat with a large gulp of beer. She can already imagine the look on Charles' face when Erik brings him his daughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed the fluff. Next up is 1983, and well... we all know that was a difficult year for everyone involved. The chapter is likely to be a few days, but I'll do my best to have it up as soon as possible. Thanks for reading!


	6. 1983

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is pointedly not beta-read. I mean, it never is, and I never actually speak English, but I'm a tiny bit tipsy as of this moment, so yeah. If you're particular about that sort of thing, maybe check back tomorrow? (Why am I posting when not entirely sober? Well, that's your answer right there... )

Erik tries to end the world. It goes about as well as expected.

Raven would feel insulted that he's fine with Apocalypse strangling her only to rush in when Charles is threatened, if a, it wasn't so utterly predictable, and b, she wasn't too busy being impressed by Jean. Nothing like a red-haired woman to save humankind from power-crazed mutants.

\---

For a while, Erik seems to be doing all right. As long as there's something tangible and immediate to do, whether it's rebuilding the mansion or keeping a hawk-eye on Charles until he regains consciousness three days after Cairo, he remains _focused_ and _there_ and as efficient as ever.

Raven remembers the way he always smiled when talking of his wife and daughter, and knows that this can't last.

May rolls around, and the restoration of the house is complete. Charles is up and about and busy turning it into a functional school once more. Erik collapses. Quietly, unseen; he simply doesn't emerge from his room one day. Or the next, or the next.

It takes her a while to notice. Enthusiastic now that she's gotten used to the idea, Raven is busy setting up the training regiment that will hone the new X-men into the elite group they'll need to be when the next big threat emerges. And it's not like she's spent a whole lot of time with Erik since Cairo anyway; with Charles around, everyone else sort of fades into the background as far as Erik is concerned.

She's stopped being annoyed with it a long time ago because really, with those two, it'd be like raging at the push and pull of the tide. But now Charles is in Washington for a few weeks, doing something political and uninteresting with Moira, and it's been three days since she caught as much as a glimpse of Erik, so.

There's no response to her call or repeated knocks on his door, so she kicks it in.

First, there's only the darkness of the room, curtains drawn shut against the brilliant sunlight outside, and the stale smell of sweat and dirty linens. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust, and then she spots him.

He's on the floor, back against a wall, knees to his chin. His eyes are dry, but the traces of tears everywhere. Apart from flinching away slightly from the imploding door, he doesn't acknowledge her intrusion.

 _Picked just the right time for his breakdown_ , Raven thinks with defensive clinical detachment. Had Charles been here, she suspects neither he nor Erik would have allowed things to go this far.

So maybe it's for the best, really, that Charles is away. Sometimes things just need to fall apart.

But still: fuck him for leaving her to deal with this. And fuck Erik for alienating all others who once might have been willing to help him. Raven isn't equipped for this sort of shit - but she wasn't equipped to be a hero either, so she supposes she'll get through it.

There's nothing to say, so she settles for sitting down next to Erik, shoulders just barely not touching.

\---

She forces him to shower, and she forces him to eat, and she forces herself not to scream and rage her frustration when he meekly, wordlessly, does as told, because this is not Erik, this broken shell of a man is not Erik, and she's not a fucking nursemaid.

But she is his friend, so she keeps her tongue and she persists, and one morning she finds him already showered and dressed when she knocks on his door, and they go for a walk.

\---

Eventually, his voice return and they talk. Mostly about her plans for the new X-men, which are many and ambitious, but May turns into June and there are other words.

”Mystique, I – ” He breaks off. ”What you said in Cairo, it – Thank you.”

She nods, and that's enough, and they talk of other things.

\---

Charles returns, but, inexplicably, Erik still spends most of his time with her. Raven isn't conceited enough to think this is due to a change in his affection, and neither does she believe it's Charles' doing. Which leaves only one conclusion:

”You're avoiding him.”

Erik pours another glass of scotch and doesn't answer. It's half past ten, and had this been a lifetime or even just a month ago, he'd been playing chess with Charles in the library by now. Instead, he's having too much to drink with her in the teacher's lounge (where there shouldn't be any alcohol, Charles has been pretty strict about that, but he's always been known to bend the rules when it comes to Erik and Raven so neither of them cares, and Charles pretends not to notice).

”Yeah, stony silence won't work on me,” Raven informs him lazily, even as she holds her glass out for him to top up. ”You're avoiding Charles, and I want to know why. It's not that I don't enjoy your company, I just want to know what game I'm part of now.” And she'd rather he didn't hurt Charles again. Her brother might be stupidly naive, sappy as fuck, and entirely too hung up on Erik Lehnsherr, but he's still her brother.

Erik glares at her, a brief flash of his old, forbidding self. ”It's no _game_.”

”No?” She hadn't thought so either, but whatever it takes actually make him speak. ”What is it then?”

He stares down at his glass, slowly sloshing the golden liquor around. The silence stretches out, becomes minutes, but that's fine. He's just considering his answer, and she knows how to wait.

”I can't stay.”

Not, she notices, _I don't want to_.

”You can't, eh?”

”No.”

”Well, no need to justify yourself to me,” Raven says dryly. ”Though if you want someone to practise on before you tell Charles, go right ahead. I can do the concerned humming and puppy-eyes sad smile and everything. Throw in something about second chances and a better world.”

The look Erik gives her is exasperated, but also – she thinks – faintly fond. ”How very obliging of you.”

”I live to serve.” A beat. ”All right, hit me. Why can't you stay?” She glances at him. ”I'm not going to try to talk you out of leaving, don't worry. I just want to make sure there's a sensible reason for it, not some fucked-up Erik reason.”

Does he look mildly insulted? If so, score. Raven raises her glass in a somewhat smug self-toast.

Another long silence, and _damn_ , they're getting good at those.

”I almost let him kill Charles.”

”Yeah, I know. I was there, remember.” She doesn't mention how he almost let Apocalypse kill _her_ because while that was an incredibly shitty thing to do, she doesn't particularly want to add to his guilt. Not because she's so very forgiving or sympathetic or anything, but it's taken her weeks to pull him even this far back from the brink and she'd rather not undo all that hard work.

”I didn't want to. I've never wanted to – ” He drinks, and she drinks, and where the fuck would they be without scotch? Charles is insane for trying to ban it.

Erik tries again, his voice unsteady, with grief or drink, she cannot – will not – tell. ”It just seemed, if I broke it off for him – ”

He's an idiot. She's always known this, of course, but he's an idiot. ”Jesus Christ, Erik. You know, you might be the only one on this damned planet who thinks _not_ ending the world out of grief for your family disrespects them. Do you think either of them would have wanted you to do it?”

He doesn't answer, and he doesn't have to. Raven never met Magda or Nina, but from what she's heard of them, neither would condone genocide.

It's only two drams later that she asks: ”You and Charles. Have the two of you, ever… ?”

”No.” He doesn't look at her. ”But I think, maybe this time, we might. If I stay.” A deep breath. ”And that's why I can't.”

And no, she supposes he can't. Not yet, at any rate. But: ”You could come back.”

Eventually he nods. ”Yes. Maybe I could.”

\---

Erik doesn't tell her goodbye, but he does Charles, and all in all, she thinks that probably more important.

”He'll be back,” she tells her brother later that evening, because even though he's trying to hide it, she knows him too well not to see and understand the long, lingering looks out the window.

”Do you really think so?” Stupid old hope, springing to life in clear blue eyes.

 _Let him down again, Erik, and I'll find you and I'll cut off your cock and I'll shove it down your damn throat._ ”Yes,” she says.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, we've got two chapters to go. Neither of them are likely to be very long, and I'm sad to say that they're not likely to be posted until mid-August either. I'm leaving for Scotland in a few days, and there's this other fic - very Cherik - that I'm writing and very excited about. Since I'm worried that my vacation will rob me of my inspiration I want to get as much done as possible before I leave, and yeah... Please be patient, and thank you for reading.


	7. 1984

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back from Scotland and ready to wrap this one up! Thank you for your patience. :)
> 
> Oh, and the bit about Erik being a vegetarian now is entirely inspired by valancysnaith's "Let Yourself Fall Ill".

Erik doesn't bat a lid when he catches sight of her lounging in the one armchair in the cabin. Raven isn't prepared for the short, sharp sting when she realizes that of course he doesn't, because unlike the last time she tracked him down like this, he needn't fear visitors. He doesn't have anyone left to protect.

She clears her throat. ”Hello, Erik.”

”Hello, Mystique.” He doesn't smile, but he doesn't look displeased to see her either. There's even the hint of vague fondness in the way he arches his brow at her. ”Are you checking up on me?”

He knows she is so she doesn't bother trying to deny it. ”Someone had to. You haven't exactly got a stellar track record of dealing well with trauma.” Which is putting it very, very lightly.

Something passes over his face, regret or amusement, she cannot say. Erik's always been hard to read. His gesture encompasses the entire room, simple furniture vaguely reminiscent of the home he had shared with his wife and daughter in Poland. ”Just a simple fisherman these days.”

And that would have surprised her, hadn't she given up on trying to figure out what he'll do next. While 'worldwide destruction' is never not a safe bet with Erik, he's proved time and again that he can – and will – do the unexpected. This time it's a cabin in the mountains just north of the Canadian border; as far as she can tell the people in the nearby village know exactly whom they buy their fresh fish and eggs from, but don't care. After all, as far as the world is concerned, Magneto's only involvement with Apocalypse was to stop him, and doesn't everybody just love a good redemption story? 'Former mutant supremacist and terrorist helps save humanity.' She wonders if Erik ever saw any of those headlines, and what he made of them.

 _The tragic loss of his wife and daughter doesn't_ _exactly lose him any sympa_ _th_ _y points_ _either._ The thought is involuntary and, while true, callous enough that she shies away from it, feeling dirty. 

”A fisherman, eh? I thought you were a vegetarian now.” She asks it unthinkingly, a bid to distract herself, and she immediately regrets it. He gave up meat for Nina, she already knows that, and the last thing she wants to do is poke at wounds not yet healed.

But Erik doesn't flinch or look away. If anything, he seems eager to answer her: ”Nina couldn't communicate with fish. They're not clever enough, or conscious enough, I guess. So we ate them. Salmon and pike and carp, mostly. Magda never had fish growing up, but she learned to like it. We both did.”

There's so much pain and grief in Erik's eyes that Raven wants to avert her own, but there's love and joy too, fierce, burning, and his voice doesn't waver.

If she had realized that coming here would have meant her swallowing down a lump in her throat every other minute, she wouldn't have bothered. She tries for a smile. ”Magda do the cooking then? I remember you being pretty decent in the kitchen.”

”We took turns.”

And he tells her all about it, and then he shows her by cleaning out a small mountain whitefish and cooking it to perfection, lemons and capers and salted butter, and the names of his wife and daughter are like prayers on Erik's lips, loving and reverent, and Raven thinks that maybe the wounds are healing after all.

\---

After dinner they get drunk because that's what they do. Raven's brought scotch, one of Charles' good bottles, and by the time the sun has set it's all but empty. She is grateful for the warm buzz the liquor lends her; it's not yet October, but the mountain air crisp and cold, and they've taken their drink outside the cabin, sitting side by side on a wooden bench overlooking the steep slopes.

”Think you'll stay here then?” she asks, waving her arm towards the hen house Erik has apparently built himself. ”Fishing and looking after your birds?” It probably comes out a little more demanding than she'd intended, but fuck it, she's had half a bottle of Balvenie triple cask and she's allowed.

Erik takes his time answering. ”I don't see why not. It's not hurting anyone.” _**I'm**_ _not hurting anyone_. He doesn't say it, but he doesn't have to. Drunk or not, hard to read or not, they've known each other for a very long time now.

”Except the fish,” Raven helpfully provides.

He gives her a look, supremely unimpressed. ”Except the fish.”

A pause then, not uncomfortable but drawn out, pregnant. Raven waits, deliberating, until she eventually offers: ”It's not _helping_ anyone either.”

A laugh that is little more than a bitter snort. ”That's why you came here? To recruit me?” The last of the scotch in his glass downed in one long sip. ”Whom did I ever help, Mystique? Or is it Raven now?”

She shrugs. ”Either is fine. It's just a name. Once it wasn't. Once the distinction was really important to me. Raven was… a pretty face to hide the real me, you know, and Mystique was everything I was trying to hide, except brought out.” She cocks her head to the side, trying to decide if what she's saying is making any sense or not. Oh, whatever. It's not the point, anyway. She blinks twice before fixing the man next to her with as firm a look as she can manage. ”You helped _me_ , Erik. I mean, you've done some spectacularly fucked up things to me too, but back then, in '62, you helped me. You told me I was beautiful the way I was, that I didn't need to change, or try to fit in. I needed that, then.”

He is staring at her, gaze intense as only Erik's can be. Then, a minuscule smile as he slowly relaxes. ”You don't need it anymore. You know it now.”

She does. She is Raven and Mystique, both and neither, and always all herself. She doesn't need Charles or Erik or anyone else to define her, and she doesn't need to hide.

They share the last few drops of Balvenie equally.

”So you are happy here then?” she asks, once the silence has grown long again. ”Being a fisherman is enough for you?”

He shakes his head. ”It was never about being a fisherman. I needed some time alone. I needed to - ”

When he doesn't finish the sentence, she nods. Of course she understands. Hell, it might even be the first time she's ever seen him deal reasonably well with loss and heartbreak. “I get it,” she assures him. “You take your time. Do whatever you need to do. Except end the world, that doesn't work. But you know that, you've already tried it.”

The soft sound Erik makes might be a chuckle or a snort. Raven turns to look at him again. “I guess I just wanted to make sure you remember that you don't have to be alone if you don't want to,” she says, and the softness of her own voice surprises her. “You still have a family waiting for you. When you're ready.” More of a family than he knows, but that's Peter's news to break. 

And Erik's smile at that might be a little tremulous, a little frail, but the hand briefly squeezing her shoulder is certain and warm, and – she thinks – a promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter to go. It shouldn't take too long to finish, but expect it to be a few days.


	8. 1985

It is just past four on an unusually warm March afternoon that Charles suddenly stiffens and then begins to smile broadly, and Raven knows that Erik's back.

“I guess we'll continue this when I get back from the field trip,” she says, rising from the chair in front of Charles' desk. They've been reviewing the results of her latest training program, and apart from a minor incident involving Scott and four vials of highly explosive liquid, the results have been pretty damned impressive. The X-men are really coming into their own, which is fortunate; Reagan's re-election doesn't bode well for their kind, and while her brother remains as doggedly optimistic as ever, even he can't deny that the need for a strong defense team is more pressing than ever.

Charles blinks a few times, eyes and mind returning to her. “What? Oh, no, you don't have to - “

“Please. Like I'd want to watch the two of you make doe eyes at each other and forget the rest of the world exists.”

“Raven, that's – “ He pauses, raising an eyebrow. “Doe eyes? Really?”

“Really. It's positively sickening.”

His lips quirk. “Then I suppose you had better leave. I'd hate for you to be sick all over my new carpet.”

She bends to kiss the dome of his bald head. They've reclaimed some of their old intimacy and ease in this past year, but it is different from what it once was, and better. She suspects that Charles will never be able to completely abandon his self-appointed role as the protective older brother, but at least he knows them for equals now, and do his best to act accordingly.

“Try not to get into an argument straightaway, okay?” she says, moving towards the door. “I'd like for the house to be still standing when I get back.”

Normally he'd reply with something supposedly witty, but now all he does is nod, eyes losing focus once more. Raven shakes her head, and shuts the door behind her.

She, quite unintentionally, runs into Erik in the hallway outside the library. In a black turtleneck and gray suit, he walks with his head held high, seemingly unconcerned with the curious and/or wary looks thrown his way by the handful of students loitering nearby. But where once there would have been a forbidding coolness to his stare, she sees… well, fuck knows what she sees, not quite warmth, not quite softness, but whatever it is, it makes him seem slightly more approachable. No longer just a grieving father or a single-minded terrorist, but both, and something in between. She is, rather unexepectedly, reminded of something Charles must have read to her once: _A single sigil torn in two. Stronger for the break._

Perhaps there are a lot of things she should say to him, ask him, but she stops at a “About time!” as she passes him by without stopping. There'll be time for the rest later, and better let him and Charles sort out their shit first.

Erik only grins, showing all his teeth in a smile she hasn't seen in a very long time.

\---

“So, do you think, like, he'll stick around this time?” Peter finally asks and he's obviously trying very hard to sound casual about it. He's spent the last three minutes – which is probably the equivalent of at least three hours in Peter-time – detailing the horrors of New Coke, and because Raven is a charitable mood she's let him, giving him what time he needs to pose his real question. Besides, having him help her pack the equipment for the field trip speeds up the process considerably, so she can stand a bit of mindless chatter.

Without looking up from a tangle of climbing ropes, playing it as cool as he is, she shrugs. “He might. Probably will for a while at least.” It's been four hours since he went up to Charles' office, and neither of them have been seen outside since, so she figures that's a good sign. The news of Magneto's return had spread through the mansion like wildfire, but so far Peter is the only one to bring it up with her directly.

Now he nods. “Cool.”

\---

The house _is_ still standing when she returns with her young charges four days later, and a brief conversation with Charles assures her that yes, Erik is still here, there has been no problems, and it's absolutely no business of yours in which room he sleeps, Raven.

Charles blushing is a novelty she takes unexpected amounts of pleasure in.

She doesn't manage to catch Erik until much later that evening. Perhaps it would be more correct to say that he catches her, but she's the one who's deliberately remained lounging on the couch in the staff room long after all the other teachers have retired, so really, credit goes both ways.

“I hear you had Ororo set fire to a small forest in Arizona,” he says, stopping just inside the door and forgoing any greetings. “I thought the trip was supposed to be a wilderness hike.”

“Diverting storms seems like an excellent survival skill in the wilderness. She needs the practice. Better a few stray bolts of lightning there than here.” And it had only been a small fire, and Storm had put it out herself by bringing rain. “I hear you are taking up teaching.”

“Just elective languages, for now.” He hesitates “Though I was thinking, if you need any help in training the X-men – “

And maybe they've all done a bit of growing up because for the first time in a long time she doesn't feel like she _has_ to manage alone, just because she _can_ manage alone. “So long as you remember who's in charge.”

“You're not likely to let me forget.” A small, wry smile.

She grins too, because he is right. “Settling in okay then?”

“I guess,” Erik allows, sauntering over to the sideboard to inspect the impressive selection of loose leaf tea Charles insists on keeping even though everyone else in the staff prefers coffee. “It's been… smoother than I'd imagined.” A beat, then an annoyed sigh. “I just wish that Quicksilver kid would stay out of my way. He's extremely annoying and seems to be everywhere I go. Does he ever stop talking?”

Raven straightens on the couch. _Oh, no. God, poor Peter…_ “You don't like him?” She keeps her voice light and even.

Erik shrugs, turning away from the tea. “He just doesn't strike me as particularly clever or powerful. A waste of space, really. An incredibly irritating waste of space.”

Her pity for Peter is quickly dwarfed by flaring anger because really, how _dare_ he - ? “Peter is really good at what he does, and really dedicated. Maybe he is a bit goofy, but he's always there for his friends, which is more than I can say for some other people I know. You - “

And she catches the small grin in the lurking in the corner of his mouth. “You bastard,” she says, glaring at him as hard as she can even as relief washes through her. “He told you then.”

“He did. He also let slip that you – and half the school it seems – knew. Has known for ages, in fact. You didn't think this was something I ought to hear about?”

He doesn't appear angry, but the look he gives her is very direct. The sort of look that sends small children and grown men alike running for cover. Fortunately, Raven is made of sterner stuff and she doesn't flinch. “I think it was something Peter should tell you, when _he_ was ready.”

A rueful grimace, defeat conceded. “I suppose. And here I was hoping it'd be something to hold against you. Even out the score a little bit.”

“Even out the score?” Raven snorts “You tried to kill me.” There's no anger in the statement.

“You shot me. I still have the scar.”

“You love the scar. Adds to your bad boy image.” She nods towards the bookcase in the far corner of the room. “The scotch is still hidden behind _Systema Naturae_.”

He obediently fetches the bottle and a couple of coffee cups and sits down next to her on the couch. Almost two years since they last sat here, she thinks, and it seems a lifetime ago; it seems just yesterday.

“I'd have expected Charles to find it by now,” Erik notes as pours. The liquor glimmers golden in the soft lamplight.

“I'm sure he has.” Has found it and left it be, hoping for the day when Erik would be back to empty it with Raven. She mocks her brother for his optimism, resents him for it at times, but now, with Erik and Charles and Hank and her all under the same roof –

Well. Maybe a little bit of hope isn't always a bad thing. Particularly not when she's there to take over when hope isn't enough. Her, and Erik.

“So you're sticking around this time, then?” Peter's question, from a few days before, but she refuses to feel silly for asking. Peter's not the only family Erik's got here.

“I am, yes.” A brief glance at her as he sips his whisky. “For now, at least. I can't make any promises about forever, Mystique. Not even for you or Charles. Or Peter.”

“For now is good enough,” she assures him, and it is the truth. In a world where mutants are still outcasts and there are many battles still to come, where families can die and you always hurt the ones you love the most, _for now_ really is the best any of them can ever ask for.

And yet, even knowing that, as she watches Erik lean back in the couch, shoulders loose and gray eyes soft, Raven finds herself believing that maybe this time, _for now_ will really be _forever_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this one was a bitch, to the point where I began to regret not making the previous chapter the last one. Still, I really wanted to end it on a happy-for-now and maybe-ever-after note, with the family of choice all brought together again. 
> 
> The quote Raven thinks of is from The Seventh Gate by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, and it makes absolutely no sense that it would occur to Raven since a, it doesn't strike me as the sort of book Charles would read, and b, it wasn't published until 1994. BUT CREATIVE FREEDOM! (Also, with this alternate timeline, who's to say it wasn't actually published back in the fifties or sixties?) 
> 
> Writing this fic has been a somewhat weird experience for me; I'm still not entirely sure how or why I decided on this particular story to tell. Largely, it's been my way of carefully edging back into narrative writing, but I hope it's been an enjoyable read all the same. Thank you so much for reading, and - if you're so inclined - let me know what you think.


End file.
